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So, I've got this niece... Ella.

She's "almost 4" and has been "almost 4" since November but her birthday happens to be in May! Ella is hilarious! I got to talk to her on the phone today. We've spoken many times before but never in such great detail and length as the way we did today. You know, I would mark today, April 1, 2008, as our first offical "real conversation" as Niece and Aunt and boy was it a fun one! We spoke mostly about her day and how it was going. Then we got to the main question: what she wants for her 4th birthday. The answer: a musical brown pony (but it could also possibly have wings and it could be red, pink, or sparkley too!!) Not sure where to find that but I try!

Anyway, this post is basically a shout out to my Sister and Brother-in-law for doing such a good job over the last 4 years in raising Ella... she's great and I can't wait to celebrate her 4th birthday with her very soon!!!


Aunt Heather & Ella at the beach in September 2007!

Carissa and Isaac

My beautiful sister, Carissa, sent me this picture today and I just had to share it. In case you didn't konw, this picture is of Carissa and my new nephew Isaac. Isn't it such a cute picture? Really though, they are a very good looking family! You can read and see more of the Mastry Family on their blog!

story of a shower (part deux)

So... our shower has become more of a major project than we expected it to (of course, right?!) Here are some pictures of what we've been up to this weekend...



door off-- check!


Heather being a good helper! (btw-I know I look like a goober in this outfit...)


Heather hurt her finger-- OF COURSE! :( (Ok, so it doesn't look that bad in this picture but it HURTS really bad.)


4 Ibuprofen and she was back in the game!


Matt taking down the walls of the shower.



Matt taking up the old shower pan



here is what was lying beneath the shower pan... yuck.



Matt diggin' in



the hole as of yesterday...


and the hole today.

Matt moved the electrical lines around so they won't be in the way and he took some of the old nasty wood out too. He's gonna try and finish the whole thing up tomorrow, as he has the day "off!"

story of a shower

So, our shower needs to be fixed. This means we have our first major home repair on our hands. Well, at least it's “major” to me. Matt would just call it "a day at the office."

Here's the story:
As I was showering Tuesday morning I pulled up our shower mat and noticed a small hole starting to develop next to our drain. The hole was letting water from our daily showers go down into the floor instead of down the drain. Honestly, the hole comes as NO surprise because our shower is SUPER ghetto. However, we were willing to live with the nastiness of our shower until we were ready to remodel that part of the house. But because of the hole it looks like we'll be starting on the shower a little sooner than we expected... like this weekend! Tonight I decided that I'd help with the demolition process and below are the pictures of what developed during the demo!

when we bought the house (we put a shower mat down before we use it though)


going at it with the hammer


here's what it looked like after I was done with it...


Heather: "Demo is fun! & Yay! A new shower is on the way!"
Matt: "ugh... there goes my Saturday..."

Easter pictures

yummy food!




Ocean, Selah, and Josh!


Sarah, Janet, and Sarah!


Ocean found the money Egg!


Josh helping Ocean find eggs!


bunny cake!

Easter

Easter Sunday! We had a lovely Easter. We started with church at 9am and followed with a Easter Lunch with friends (about 25 friends!) We even had an Easter Egg Hunt in our front yard! Hope you had a great Easter too!

how can it be August?

welp, we've been rafting and to Mexico in the time that has past since our last post... now I'm training for a triathlon... we'll see how that goes! I'm not feeling to confident at this point. But I figure I can always swim slow, bike at a decent pace and then walk the run, right? We'll see how it goes...